Thank you for indulging me once more.

For anyone who's ever unsuspectantly fallen victim to that deviously accidental kind of love...this story's for you.


To say that Bo and Luz experienced hard times on the outset of their arranged partnership would be a foul understatement. My waking thought those first days was a panicked Is the little one still alive?

And now, a month later, they are, quite simply, the languishing "loves of eachother's lives".

The following pictures are meant to display what love, to that notoriously selfish feline breed, means.



Love is always agreeing to share the most comfy side of the couch.


Love is clinging to him like you're Carrie Fisher on Jabba the Hut.





And finding ways to get frisky on your own when brother is simply too pooped out.




Love is shelving your fears and braving a walk around the "great unknown" because you don't want to be apart from your buddy. (Yes - we take daily field trips around the apartment building. What can I say? I want my babies to experience the world.)


Love is always wanting at least one part of your body to be touching one part of his.


An unfortunate, yet forgivable result of this newly evolved family dynamic? L and I have been shoved into the back seat of family life.

We have become, quite simply, the creatures that open Fancy Feast cans. That dangle catnipped mice in front of weary, indifferent eyes. That daily clean up after the devestation caused by ongoing love-war. We are Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, scooping the poop.

"This is, in fact, World War III."

The Israeli-Lebanese border, seeming peaceful since Israel's withdrawal from south Lebanon in 2000, has erupted into a war zone. On this, the sixth day of warfare, the death toll on both sides has surpassed 200 lives, with no resolution in sight.

Hezbollah leader Sheik Hassan Nasrallah claims his terrorist group (one so large and dynamic, it now basically controls the Lebanese government) has "complete strength and power", and asserts that "Hezbollah is not fighting a battle for Hezbollah or even for Lebanon. We are now fighting a battle for the Islamic nation."

Listing wars in Afghanistan, Iraq, the North Korean nuclear threats, terrorist arrests and investigations in Florida, Canada and Britain, last week's bomb attacks in India, and violence in Israel and Lebanon as evidence, former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich today pronounced, "This is, in fact, World War III."

During my recent travels, I made plans to visit Beirut, a city rumoured among hostel dwellers to be the crown jewel of Arabian destinations.

In Amman, Jordan, I befriended a group of kids who would shortly be making their way, via Syria, to the Lebanese capital. And I would have, in fact, joined them, but that visas are currently not issued to U.S. citizens at the Jordanian-Syrian border, and must be obtained in advance at the U.S. embassy in Amman.

Long story short -- I opted, ironically, to visit Israel instead.

I bring up this "coulda, woulda, shouldn'ta" story, not so much to brag at my plucky daring, as to preface my obvious point: there is a labyrinth of overdue chaos lying beneath the surface of today's world, and who can predict where and when it will materialize?

A month ago, I had plans to visit Beirut -- now a half-deserted war zone. How foolish.

And yet, I live in Manhattan -- a 23 square mile island, where magazines such as The New Yorker and The Daily Post regularly place their bids on precisely how it is that our City will next be attacked, while most residents agree that "it's only a matter of time."

And, even this week, my sister and I were planning a December trip to India, a country just victimized by a series of terrorist bombings.

I agree with the Newt -- it seems that we are inadvertantly sliding into a third world war.

And, in my respectfully undistinguished opinion, unless you live in Centerville, Texas (hi, grams), you should not consider yourself safe.

Where Bo hides when trying to escape baby sister...

Love blooms.